Keep school start time the same

Many families have been at Renaissance Academy for years, and enjoy the 8 o'clock start time. Work schedules, activity schedules, and sleep schedules are planned around school hours for many families. If the start times change, suddenly work hours for parents are going to have to change, including the time parents get home from work. After-school activity times will need to be delayed (or canceled because of the later school end time). What it essentially means is that a family's entire day will be shifted 30 minutes. Including bedtimes! I don't think that starting school 30 minutes later for the minority of families who have difficulty getting to bed on time makes sense for the majority of families who plan accordingly.

I believe that the studies cited for students getting enough sleep were done on a high school and sometimes middle school level. Norwalk Hospital sleep specialists advise, “The circadian biology of sleep would predict that among individual children, those who are predisposed to be ‘night owls’ would be even more likely to suffer the consequences of sleepiness in a school system that imposes start times before 9 a.m.” (2) Many scientists urge even later starting times, (7) particularly for older adolescents. (65) Notably, morning administration of the ACT and SAT exams tends to favor larks over owls. (261, 336)

Also "among school-aged children, only middle-school and upper class students show achievement gains as a result of later school scheduling; see, § IV, infra)"

But on an elementary school level (especially with 9th grade being cancelled at our school and the 7th and 8th grades being a clear minority at our school) an "early to bed, early to rise" is a healthier habit to form in young children.

Please sign this petition to show our school that the large majority of our school feels strongly that we keep the current school schedule.